[Waldemar Duszka]

Hi
In Poland, Czelkin found in burials of warriors dating from the I BC - III AD, among other artifacts was this beautiful spearhead.
As you can see in the picture has the two holes around which is an oval ring.
I wonder if the holes are the inlays (bronze, silver, gold), which is not what remained of reasons.
What do you think?

[Peter Johnsson]

Ring-dot decorations of this type is not uncommon in the Danish bog finds.
I would guess that there was originally an inlay of silver or copper alloy in this spear head. Why the metal of the inlay is no longer present, I don´t know. If it is a fire burial, it might have melted out? Or perhaps it wss removed for some reason before being interred in the burial?

[Daniel Wallace]

silver or gold i see melting out if burned, but copper? i think a fire hot enough to melt copper would leave nothing of the iron behind.

I'd want to believe that if these were some kind of precious metal, someone pinched them with a five finger discount.

sorry i am just adding ideas

[Tyler Keich]

When I see that, I'm reminded of these, so my guess will be silver.


http://www.archaeoschmiede.de/page5.html

[Dylan Holderman]

i am a newbie here but i seem to recall a discussion on another forum about arrow heads with a hole in them to make noise maybe this one is something like that?

[Daniel Wallace]

i have heard about the whistling arrows before as well, Chinese. they were more of a command signal. arrows were made with distinctive whistles to command troops to attack targets - withdraw - and other actions. a commander could watch the battle and if he desired shot an arrow over his troops to give a command rather than dispatch someone to give verbal orders to them, costing time.

this is probably something more ceremonial pictured here. and the chances of these holes being filled with an inlay material seems like the most probable answer to why they are made with hole in them. a silver rod may have gone through the center - and the channel was filled with a ring.

[Jean Henri Chandler]

They also used whistling crossbow bolts, called bremsen, in the Baltic area and in Poland.

Though I'm leaning toward the silver, quite a beautiful artifact there (as are the others shown)

J

[Kevin Horne]

[William P]

The holes might perhaps have multiple roles to play, their inclusion is extra work therefore extra expense therefore a status symbol,
they look nicer,

as for the whistling, one thing i know about 'celts' and their 'family' seeing as how the celts at one point spanned most of europe
based on accounts of the romans facing the gallic celtsd and british celts, one thing roman and greek writers noted was that they LOVED to make lots of noise, shouting, clamouring, with big horns and wooden 'tongues', creating more noise

They wouldn't function very wellas a whistling arrowhead, it;'s the wrong set of holes, just as a guess, however as the wind blows hard they might whistle just a bit, or, whem waving the spear wildly back and forth, or riding hard, the rushing movement MIGHT create a whistle

that being said, i'm more likely to lean towards the purely decorative angle, if it was meant to make noise it'd perhaps have more holes or something to facilitate it

[Dan P]

I wonder if there was a smith making spear blades, who was well into a project when he noticed there was a thin spot or inclusion or something in the middle of the blade. Thinking fast, he turned the flaw into a hole, and then made a symmetrical or complimentary hole on the other side of the spine. The local chief wanted a spear with some kind of unique mark, because every warrior in his band had a spear and he wanted to stand out. "Holes!" he said. "This is a good spear and I've never seen holes in a spear before! I will show this spear to everyone I meet and they will think it is fashionable because I am a successful war chief."

And the rest is history.

[Daniel Wallace]